1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to flooring for a building, and more specifically to flooring washable at its installation place in a building.
2. Description of the Related Art
Flooring for a building which requires water washing is formed, in most cases, through a series of steps: applying leveling mortar to a concrete floor slab, coating it with asphalt, forming a presser mortar layer, forming a cinder concrete layer, applying mortar as tile bedding, and finishing with tiles. The flooring formed through such steps is excellent in its water-proofness. On the other hand, it requires a quite long time in forming, which gives a major factor in prolonging construction period. Moreover, an enormous cost is required to repair the flooring even if it is partial damage.
Then, the inventors of the present invention have proposed a flooring structure capable of solving the problem described above.
The invention concerned is, as disclosed in Japanese Patent Publication No. 2539709, a flooring structure in which floor panels are arranged above a floor slab surface to effectively drain the water sprinkled on the floor panels.
To be specific, a joint member is placed between every adjacent floor panels out of a plurality of floor panels set on a plane, and joist members are arranged to support the right and left edges of the respective floor panels. Sleeper members for supporting the joist members are further arranged perpendicular to the joist members, and water communication holes are provided to communicate the joist members and the sleeper members.
One water communication hole consists of a hole formed in one joist member and a hole formed in the associated sleeper member which coincide with each other. Each joist member has a flange to prevent waste water from leaking outside.
A drain pipe for draining water flown therein from between the floor panel and the joint member is provided on an end of each sleeper member.
Strut members for supporting the sleeper member are arranged on the bottom surfaces of both ends of each sleeper member, and are grounded on the floor slab surface of the building so that the entire members are held.
A cylindrical ventilation body is connected to each sleeper member so that no smell stays in a space above the flooring as well as the interior of the sleeper member and the joist member is dried.
The structure described above makes it possible to assemble, with a simple construction, flooring capable of effectively drain washing water on the floor, where the water used to wash the flooring flows through the joist member to the sleeper member and is drained from the drain pipe to the outside.
As a result of extensive investigation, the inventors of the present invention have found that the flooring described above still has room to improve, i.e., that the thickness of the flooring should be thinned further as a whole and that the workability should be improved even more.
The present invention has been made in view of the above, and an object of the present invention is therefore to provide washable flooring for a building which can readily be constructed with a simple work.
The gist of the present invention is as follows.
According to the present invention, in flooring for a building which has a plurality of floor panels laid in parallel to constitute a whole floor, an opening is formed on a floor surface between one floor panel and its adjacent floor panel. The flooring for a building according to the present invention is provided with a gutter portion that is arranged below the opening to receive a liquid dripping from the opening. The gutter portion is formed as an integral part of the one floor panel, and communicates with a drain pipe for draining the liquid in the gutter portion to the outside.
Each of the floor panels has the gutter portion on one side and, on the other side, a connecting portion for connecting the gutter portion of another floor panel. The floor panels having the same shape are arranged such that the gutter portion of one floor panel is connected to the connecting portion of another floor panel, whereby the plural floor panels paralleled in the lateral direction may constitute the whole floor.
Alternatively, each of the floor panels may be formed into a rectangular shape in plane, and a plurality of sleeper members each having a flow path open to above and supporting the floor panel may be provided beneath the whole floor.
Each of the sleeper members is substantially perpendicular to the gutter portion at a vertical position below the gutter portion, and the gutter portion communicates with the flow path of the sleeper member to flow the liquid in the gutter portion into flow path.
A second opening may be formed on a floor surface between one floor panel and its longitudinally-adjacent floor panel, and one sleeper member may be arranged under this second opening, so that the flow path in the sleeper member directly receives a liquid dripping from the second opening. Note that longitudinally-adjacent floor panels means floor panels adjacent to each other in the direction coaxial with the gutter portion.
Also may be provided between every adjacent floor panels is a catch basin portion that is on the same plane as the surface of the floor panels.
The catch basin portion can take any structure as long as it is capable of bearing the weight of people who step on it and of passing a liquid such as washing water from the surface to the underneath. For example, it may be a catch basin portion having a lot of slits perforated to communicate spaces above and under the floor, or may be a mesh-like catch basin portion. Alternatively, the catch basin portion may be formed of a water-penetrative material.
According to the present invention, it is possible to obtain washable flooring for a building which can readily be constructed with a simple work.
It is also possible to obtain washable flooring for a building whose thickness can be thinned as a whole.
It is also possible to obtain washable flooring for a building which has excellent drain efficiency.
It is also possible to obtain washable flooring for a building whose components are easy to mold.